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Hey, there are restaurant pros, it's David Scott Peters, and welcome to Episode 17 of the restaurant Prosperity Formula. I've been coaching restaurant owners since 2003 and the restaurant prosperity formula is based on what the most successful restaurant owners I've worked with do on a daily basis to achieve their success.

The basic premise of the formula centers around achieving prosperity, freedom from your restaurant and the financial freedom you deserve. To achieve prosperity, you have to follow a very specific formula made up of leadership systems, training, accountability and taking action. Today's topic centers around getting the most out of your management team versus enabling them to do the minimum in this episode. I want to share with you the three lessons you must teach your managers and supervisors that empower them to do their job.

If you're tired of doing everything yourself, you're tired of the excuses and you want things to change, you'll want to listen to every minute. As a bonus, I'm going to share with you how to ensure your managers are getting things done your way. Let's get started. But first, a word from our sponsor. This episode is being brought to you by repeat returns. If you're a restaurant owner of a medium to high volume independent restaurant multiunit or franchise operator, and you're looking for a proven and realistic solution to attract, grow and retain customers, then you need to visit, repeat returns, repeat returns.

As a modern marketing platform created by a restaurant owner for restaurant owners, it studies each customer's habits and patterns, predicts the most profitable outcome for your restaurant every single day, and deploys the marketing. To make that happen, you'll never lift a finger to see if repeat returns is right for you. Visit repeat returns dot com forward slash DSB. As a restaurant coach, I talked with literally dozens of restaurant owners and managers on a weekly basis. Some are existing members and some are first time discovery calls.

No matter who I'm talking with, there is a common theme among many of these calls. My managers aren't getting the job done. I don't know what to do. Well, let me paint a picture for you. This is what you tell me literally on a daily basis. One of my favorites. If you want something done right, you've got to do it yourself. You know, that endless cycle of you try to give up work, right? You delegate tasks, you give them to your management team.

They ultimately fail time and time and time again to a point where you stop trying. You're like, you don't even know why you have managers in the first place. So if you want something done right, you do it yourself. The problem is you're teaching your people you'll fix everything. In fact, you're you're going to enable them to do nothing. Does your phone buzzed with a text message that the kitchen sink is leaking? And what do you say you text back? OK, I'll bring my toolbox in in the morning and I'll take care of it.

You go to the hardware store and you go get a 20-cent ring and you install it for them, like your managers couldn't have gotten their own damn 20 cent overing for you and used a wrench to change it. But at this point in time, you've got yourself in this nasty cycle. How about this one? You've tried you've tried to get everything in your restaurant, but you get pushback. Our restaurants different.

What does that mean, our restaurant is different. We're in the hospitality business no matter whether you're quick service restaurant doing three hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year or you're a fine dining, full service restaurant doing five million dollars a year. We're all put on this earth to create memories, great hospitality. We all have food. We all have people with our customers, our employees. There's nothing different. Maybe the envelope of your restaurant is different, but you are not different.

The problem here is what you teach your people is they can outlast you if they keep pushing back, saying, no, we're different. No, we're different. You finally give up. Lastly. It feels like your management team, all they do is bring problems to you for you to fix, and the reality is this problem is just an extension of the first two. So how do you stop this cycle of overwhelming yourself and setting such low expectations for your management team?

How do you put yourself in a place of leadership, which is where exactly you belong? That's what I want to talk to you about now. I want to share with you three lessons. You must teach your managers and supervisors that empower them to get their job done. So here they go. Let's start with lesson one. Lesson one is what does try and get you. So I want you to do me a favor. I want you to play along with me.

So just imagine him sitting across from you, I'm looking at you say, do me a favor, I want you to try and pick a pen, so hopefully have a pen or pencil nearby. Would you place it on the surface in front of you? And I want you to try and pick it up. Now, don't touch the pen, try and pick it up, don't touch the pen, I want you to try and pick it up, try and pick it up, get your hands right next. Try. You are not trying hard enough, right? Do you see the pen lifting itself up? No. So what does trying get you?

Trying ultimately gets you nothing. I want to hear I tried David. I tried to get to my managers do it. I tried. All it means is anything that comes after that is an excuse. Better yet, so when my daughter, who's now a college freshman, just turned 19, but when six years ago, six, it's crazy to think about this when she was 13 years old. Thirteen years old. I think she was finishing middle school, so eighth grade.

I had a friend over and like Brooke, what is trying and get you now, I'm waiting for my daughter to spit out trying. Gets you nothing. But she freezes, she doesn't know exactly what I want her to say, she doesn't remember. But out of her mouth comes trying leads to excuses like, you got to be kidding me. I'm like, I own that. I'm using that from this point forward.

I still give her credit for it from a 13 year old young girl from her mouth trying leads to excuses. Are you allowing your managers to continue to make excuses, you don't want excuses. How about listen to. Don't tell me why it can't be done. Tell me how it can be done. So let's first start with this. I can't get this to work. I can't find the time. I can't get someone to do this.

Well, the first lesson of that is tell them. To repeat that phrase back to you, but change the world, the word can't with won't, I won't get them to do that. I won't get this done. I won't. Isn't that what they're ultimately telling you ? They're they're saying the word can't is just this, like release valve of steam that says I don't have to try. You build up all this pressure and all the stress and you go, oh, see, I don't have to do it.

I said, I can't. Well, when you rephrase it, you won't that's a completely different story. Now here's the deal. When you teach them to tell you how it can be done, not why it can't. Now we're saying, hey, maybe it's going to take too much time. Maybe it cost too much money. Maybe it alters the standard workflow and it doesn't make sense for a restaurant. But anything can be done if you don't explore the possibilities. If you put up a wall and say it can't be done, well, then guess what? It won't be done.

Less than three. Don't come to me with a problem, come to me with a solution. Now this is important. It depends on your your level of responsibility. So, for instance, if you've got an assistant manager, line supervisor walks in your office and goes, hey. The air conditioner just fell through the roof. Well, that's not in their responsibilities, right? I'm going straight to the top to the owners saying, hey, you better call insurance and I don't know what to do, but the air conditioner just fell right through our roof.

Now, very different story when let's say your broad line distributor is supposed to be dropping off 50 steaks for a party you're having there, you've got a gathering in your private private room and you need these specialty steaks. You don't normally have them. And in that morning, here comes your order. The truck pulls up, everything gets unloaded. They shorted you 50 steaks. Now, the manager normally would walk into your office and go, well, guess what, Brazilian distributor screwed us again.

We don't 50 stakes. What do you want me to do? And then we're back to if you want something done right, do it yourself. You throw your pen down, hang up your phone, whatever it is, and go harumph and you go fix the problem. That's not what I want for my management team. I want my managers to come into my office. With a solution, better yet, multiple solutions that I get to pick, let's say, for instance, we have this scenario. Hey, I want to let you know that our broadband distributor just pulled up, we don't have the stakes for tonight's party.

Now, I could go to that broad line distributer, it's going to be a three hour turnaround. They are about an hour away. I got to go, will call. I got to sign things off, pay for it. I've got to come back, you know, unload unload my truck. That's an option I called our secondary vendor and they can have them here, there are 50 cents more a pound now that hurts, but they're not going to be here till four o'clock. Party goes off at 5:00. We got some prep to do.

I don't really think I can wait that long or I can go to the grocery store. I've already called them and they've got something similar in the butcher shop and they'll cut them up for us. Now it's about a dollar more a pound, but I can have them like in the next 30 minutes I'm going to suggest I go to the store and buy those. What would you like me to do? Well, holy cow, tell me. You wouldn't be like, wow, who is this person? And you might said, hey, you didn't think about there's that third vendor they'll hot shot it over here.

You know, they owe me a favor, DataDot and you can send them down another path and you don't have to do the work. Or you might say, no, I actually want you to do option two. I think they can be here by four o'clock. I can jump on the line and I can help you prep or do whatever it may be. But now see what a difference is when your manager comes to you with a solution. Now, the key to this, though, is why those are very simple, right ?

There's really two missing pieces for implementing these three lessons into your daily routine, and it's ultimately being able to successfully delegate and hold your management team accountable. See, without successful delegation, it doesn't matter what those lessons are, because ultimately people will excuse it away and they don't learn. You'll still fix everything. They'll still come to you with problems, they'll still tell you why it can't be done.

So what you've got to do is put them on a path to success, not only teach them those lessons, but ultimately learn how to successfully delegate and hold them ultimately accountable. So let's talk about the five critical steps to successful delegation. The first step is to be specific and clear. Tell them exactly what you want done. The second step is define what success looks like. That's basically when it's completed. Three, I need you to let it go.

But here's really important. There will be milestones. See, we're not just going to give it up and pray gets done. That's when we ultimately get to that deadline and nothing's been done or it's been done wrong and you get pissed like you always do. Instead, we will be checking in on it. Now. Number four, continued communication. Again, we will be inspecting every process of the way, every milestone and in between those milestones, see, a lot of managers think that's called micromanagement.

You give me something to do and you keep checking on me. No, that's not micromanagement. Micromanagement is. Give me that. You're not doing it right. I'll just do it. I'm going to follow up, I'm going to ensure that you get it done the way I want it done on time. So basically, in order to do that, we're all now from the state of Missouri, why it's the Show Me state. So you're going to learn to say how things are going great, show me and I'll talk about that in just one moment.

And number five, recognition and reward. You want to go out of your way to make sure that you understand. You let them know you understand. They did a good job. They got what you want done. Now, whether that's, you know, trade with another restaurant for a for a certificate, for a meal in a nice night out with their family, whether it's movie tickets, a bonus or just a genuine thank you, you want to make sure you recognize them. So let's walk through this process successfully delegating, let's say in the old you.

You'd come up and say, hey, I just saw this guy, David Scott Peter, speak at a show and he talked about the importance of recipe coastguards. And we need these recipe cards. Hey, chef, I want them done by the end of the month. He said they're one of the two most important systems in the restaurant. I want them done in the month. What do you think? What a chef say. Sure. Absolutely not. A month goes by, what do you get, zero, nada, nothing, because the manager in this case, the chef, didn't buy into the process.

Wasn't important, couldn't be done, I'll tell you, yes, but what are you going to ultimately do? You're going to maybe yell at me, but I still have my job. Nothing changes because you're not willing to hold me accountable. We'll talk about that in a second. Now, the new you following this five step to successful delegation, these critical steps to delegation. Are going to be like this. Hey, chef. I just saw this guy, David Scott Peterson, the local show, food show, and he talked about recipe coastguards and I know it's critical to our success.

I want to reengineer our menu. In order to do that, we've got to have these recipe cards along with our premix. And he tells me we can move the needle three to seven points the first time we could actually lower our food costs as much as seven points if we do this right. So I need these recipe cards are extremely important. Question is really, can we have them done by the end of the month? Now, if you're listening to me, we're going to pause out of the roleplay right now, and I want you to write this down. The question you're going to ask is, is that reasonable?

This is something you're going to pull out of your your leadership toolbox all the time. So now we go through that back into the roleplay. Hey, saw this guy, Dave Scott Peterson. He'd recipe cards, want to lower food costs three to seven points, need recipe cards. I'd love to have them done by the end of the month. Is that reasonable? See, if you don't have your managers buying into the process, then it's impossible now. No, you know, I am so glad you asked this, chef.

We've got our busiest catering month of the year coming up. I'm short too. Cooks. I really don't think I get it done in a month. I know they're important. I want to get them done for you, but I think it's going to be very difficult. Now, you say, well, what do you think is reasonable? One hour, chef. If I'm a chef, I'm going to try and push this off as much as possible. I know what I've got to get done in my business, so maybe I push it off to, you know, three months. Now, your job is the owners to lead.

You say, chef, I certainly understand your challenges, but we really have to get this done every month that goes by, we're losing thousands upon thousands of dollars and I really need to make that change. We need to to make sure we've got everybody paid and we'll keep the lights on and we make it a good business. How about two months? And what I'm going to do is I'm going to ask if you write everything down, I'll get the front of house managers to put them into the software package that we use.

 

Now, watch Chef light up, you're going to tell me all you can do is write this stuff down and someone else will put them in there. That's right. Now, chef, you've got to double check that. Right. But, yes, I will get you front of house managers. You can delegate that process. Can we have it done in two months? Yeah. You give me the help. I can get that done. Now, that's really important. Now you say, wait a second, I've got to go to the second step, define what success looks like. Let me be very clear on what I mean by recipe crossing cards.

See, what you're going to do now, Chef, is you're going to start off and you're going to grab our menu and you going to write down one dish after another. What those ingredients, components of dish soups, side dishes, desserts, sauces. Diced onions and so on, that we manufacture, if you will, ourselves, that we make ourselves from other products. And what you're going to do is you're going to write that down and each unique item, we're going to create this checklist that those have to be documented first, because we certainly know all the products we get from our distributors and our vendors.

And we can certainly, you know, know what an ounce of each of those things are in yield tests and things like that. But our own soups, sauces, side dishes and so on, we didn't know what they cost. They need to be done first before you even attempt the recipe cards. Now, once you do that and you've got everything into the software system, it's very easy building it. But what I need you to do. Is I need you to make sure you verify that the recipes you thought you trained are the ones being executed, that you verify those, then you put them into the system.

By the way, successful recipe Kosten cards are not just the costing, but I want we make cost by the ounce, but we make the recipe by the each. And I want you to have recipe cards to go along with it so we can create our build charts to go along with those. And I want product knowledge for our front of house team that they know we use Vidalia onions that are exceptionally sweet come from one crop a year so that when we put that that out there, they can describe it to the guests.

So when we're done, you're going to have three books, recipe costing cards, you kind of recipe cards and you have training cards. That way we have everything, everything done. Now that's very different than give me recipe coastguards, isn't it? Now, the next step is to let it go, but no, you've got to give me milestones, some milestones allow me to say, hey, we have this many cards by this date, by this date, by this date, by this date, ultimately going up to the end date of that, it's done complete.

So let's say, for instance, H.F., the first milestone I want to set is five recipe cards done by the end of the week. Is that reasonable? Well, yeah, it's one a day. Of course, I can do five recipe cards. Fantastic. Now, the old you. Who don't follow up on things would come to the middle of the week, say, chef, how are things going with the recipe cards? And Chef would go there doing great, doing great. And you get to Friday. And how many would you have done? Nothing or worse.

You allowed Chef to get to Friday and did five of them absolutely asinine, wrong, maybe don't understand the software, maybe don't understand recipe crossing cards because they're not every chef has been exposed to that. And that's not that's not a negative. It's just a matter of they need to learn. So wouldn't it be nice to learn that especially before they got three hundred recipe cards done and you look at the end date because we've got now milestones. So now we sit there and say we're going to have continued communication, we're halfway through the week for the milestone shift, how those recipe cards come in, they go great, you say great.

Show me. There's no conflict in that there's no I don't believe you. It's not condescending, it's great, show me and when you go look, maybe you find Chef didn't get anything done because, you know, here's the deal. We lost another cook. Can I have a little more time? Who said you can't move the deadline? That it's not reasonable to do so? Things happen or I call restaurant happens. Maybe you see, chef is doing them wrong, doesn't understand the software, doesn't understand the process.

Wouldn't it be nice to teach them right then in there that you can see that there needs to be a change, that they don't continue to make the same mistake going forward? See, this has no conflict to it whatsoever. You are truly just following up. And then when this is all done, it's the recognition or reward part. It's the handshake. It's the thank you. It's the bonus. Whatever that project is that you have a task that you've delegated. So you've gone through and you've made sure they not only understand what it is, but what success looks like.

Right, you've given it away, put Milestone's in place and recognize them, giving them rewards. So now you know how to successfully delegate, and that is truly a gift. Because all too often we always think we delegate because we give it to somebody and it doesn't get done. Now, lastly, you have to be willing to hold your management team accountable, and that should not be a negative when it's done correctly.

See, accountability to most people is I'm going to hold you accountable if you tell your managers you're going to hold them accountable when they hear right. That's me hitting my hand. That's you hitting them in the face. I'm a hold you accountable. No, that's not what it is, it's not a negative. See, I redefine what accountability means, I, David Scott Peters definition, not Wikipedia, not Webster's or anything else. My definition, when done properly, is we change the word accountability to the word answerability.

It's the acknowledgement of responsibility for your obligations, decisions and actions and how you were answerable for the resulting consequences. So what are your obligations? Your obligations, your job, your job obligations are to perform your job to a specific list of expectations. But here's the deal. Where we fall short is we tell somebody what their job is, but that's not good enough in order to successfully delegate, in order to ultimately hold someone accountable.

You've got to teach them what their job is. And that's what the job is, how to do it, how well it should be done, more importantly, by win. So it's not just take inventory, taking inventory is maintaining the software that all new products are in there and the products are made useable, we change them from how we buy them to how we store them, to how we use them, including yield tests.

It is making sure that any recipes that are new this week are in the software so we know the costs, especially if we've only soups, side dishes, components, desserts, sauces, you get the picture because those are going to be on inventory, any new product and any new recipe. Battersby needs to be placed in the software on shelf to cheat inventory in the order you want it counted, how you want it counted.

You need to verify by Saturday night that your shelf, the sheet inventory is being maintained print off by Sunday morning. Your your sheets. To be able to take inventory and at 10:00 at night, start counting dry storage tapered off that it's done, go to the freezer, tape it off that it's done, go all the way through the process, have two people counting at all times, counting it in the order it appears the way you see it.

Then by Monday morning, you want it into the software and verified that there are no mistakes, that we don't have thirty thousand dollars in shredded cheese, that our inventory doesn't look high or doesn't look low. And if it does, did we count properly? Are we missing invoices? Are the sales correct? And then by one o'clock in the afternoon, you need to text message me, the owner or the general manager that my inventories are in and those cost goods sold numbers are good.

Now, that's being specific and clear, and you train them on it and you follow through, you make sure you're over their shoulder in till they can do it on their own, see, until they can do it on their own and show you whatever the task is in the job, then they can't be held accountable. You can get. I didn't know. I don't want to hear I didn't know you knew exactly what the job is, how to do it, how well it should be done, more importantly, by when not only did I train you, not only did I help you by being over your shoulder, not only was it over your shoulder until you could do it on your own successfully without me helping you.

And then I left you. Now you know what the job is, how to do it, how well it should be done. More importantly, why, when you know your job, the job which I ultimately can hold you answerable for it, next you get to make a decision since you know your job. You can make a decision based on your obligations, are you going to do your job or not do your job? See, that's what we do as a manager. When I was a manager, I knew I had to take inventory. I to make a decision, take inventory or don't take inventory.

Well, in this case, take inventory, see, here's the deal. What if I don't? What if I do? See, your actions are what you do as a result of your decisions, which are ultimately the basis for what you'll be answerable for. See, I'm going to be answerable, held accountable to me doing my job or not. Right. I know the job. I make a decision to do it or not and ultimately answerable for doing it or not.

So it's not you, the big bad general manager, not you, the big bad owner. It is fair for everyone. And that's how we can get things done to hold people accountable. We teach them the lessons right to become better managers, to empower them to do their job without looking to you to fix everything. We teach them when we delegate exactly our expectations, what success looks like when it's done, we give it up, put milestones in place, we check in on them and we recognize give them recognition for what they've done.

But if you ultimately don't hold someone accountable or answerable, none of that matters. Then you're back in a position to where you can't trust anyone to get it done. I know this is a lot to take in. All I know is what I just shared with you can change your life, and I'm not kidding when I say that your goal is restaurant prosperity, freedom from your restaurant and the financial freedom you deserve.

And if that's what you want, then managers play a critical role in achieving that dream. So go out there and achieve that dream. Hey, that was an awesome episode. I want to thank you for taking the time to take action on building a better, more prosperous restaurant. Before you go, I want to give you these three thoughts. One, by combining leadership and taking action with systems and training, being checked by accountability, you are on your way to creating prosperity for you and your restaurant to have something I need from you.

Please leave a review on Apple podcast, Spotify or wherever you happen to listen to podcasts by leaving us a review of the restaurant. Pros seeking out this information are able to find it. I read the reviews in a hearing how this information has benefited you but does wonders for me. And three, if you find any of the discussions helpful, share them. The more restaurant pros who have access to them, the better we become as an industry for more restaurant resources or to get in contact with me. Connect with me at David Scott Peters Dotcom.

Be passionate about what you're doing. Be persistent, but more importantly, become better and help everyone around you become better. And your restaurant is going to kick some ass. If you're tired of not being able to leave your restaurant because no one else knows how to run it, I want to make sure you know, it doesn't have to be that way. You can leave your restaurant. It is possible to build a team of people who know how you want the restaurant to run with these trained and responsible people in place, you can give yourself time away.

What would you do if you had time away from your restaurant? Would you sleep better? Would your relationships improve? Would you feel more relaxed? These are all things you deserve to experience as a business owner. It's why we own our own businesses. If you would like to learn how to own a restaurant that doesn't depend on you to be successful, click here to watch a free training course that teaches you exactly what you have to do. Also, be sure to subscribe to get my weekly tips on YouTube and watch more videos to get more information and guidance for running a successful restaurant.